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Lowell mom, daughter seriously injured in Boston blast

By Christopher Scott, cscott@lowellsun.com

Updated:
04/16/2013 05:33:43 PM EDT

An emergency responder and passerby tend to Sydney Corcoran, a Lowell High School student who was injured by shrapnel in Monday's bomb explosion at the Boston Marathon. (AP Photo/The Boston Globe, David L Ryan)

While crossing a busy street at Salisbury Beach in June 2011, Corcoran was struck by a car driven by a senior citizen. The accident left her with severe injuries, including a fractured skull.

But Sydney, 18, a Lowell High School senior bound for Middlesex Community College this fall, dug deep and fought valiantly to preserve her young life. Family members breathed sighs of relief, hoping they would never have to relive such a nightmare.

But on Monday, shrapnel from one of the bombs that exploded during the Boston Marathon shredded both of Sydney's legs, leaving her with deep arterial injuries, said her older brother, Tyler Corcoran, during an interview Tuesday morning in the kitchen of the family's home in the city's Pawtucketville neighborhood.

Sydney, with her mother, Celeste, and father Kevin, were in Boston to watch her aunt, Carmen Accabo, of Westford, finish the storied event. Celeste, too, was struck by shrapnel and overnight had both legs amputated below the knee, Tyler said. Kevin received minor injuries, but otherwise was physically okay. He was at the Boston Medical Center bedsides of both his wife and daughter Tuesday, said his brother, Tim Corcoran, of Rhode Island.

"My brother is just heartbroken, just devastated," Corcoran said on his cell phone as he drove up Interstate 95 to be with his brother.

Kevin drives a delivery truck for F.W. Webb Company, a Bedford-based plumbing supply company. Celeste is a hairdresser who works in a salon on Newbury Street in Boston.

Like his uncle, Tyler was also heading to the hospital today to be with his father, mother and sister. Tyler had planned to be with his family at the finish line Monday, but the Middlesex Community College student was scheduled to meet with a study group.

"I was supposed to be there," said Tyler, fighting back tears. "I didn't even think this whole thing was real until my phone started ringing like crazy later in the afternoon.

Carmen Accabo, of Westford, left, with her sister, Celeste Corcoran, of Lowell, and Corcoran s daughter, Sydney, 18, right, on Easter. The Corcorans, along with the family s patriarch, Kevin Corcoran, were on Boylston Street in Boston Monday watching Acabbo finish the Boston Marathon when one of the bombs was detonated. Celeste Corcoran was severely injured and had both legs amputated below the knee and Sydney, a Lowell High School senior, has serious arterial injuries to both legs. Both are in critical condition at Boston Medical Center.
(Courtesy photo)

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The explosive devices were detonated seconds apart, several hundred feet west of the finish line near the Boston Public Library, both near the Boylston-Exeter streets intersection. It's unclear precisely where the Corcoran family stood. Tyler said his father described a surreal scene of gusts of wind generated by the blasts and "debris flying everywhere." Three people were killed, including an 8-year-old Dorchester boy, and nearly 200 were injured, many seriously.

"My father said everyone seemed in a daze. He looked down and saw my mom and her eyes were open. Once he realized she was alive, he noticed both her legs hanging on by skin. He asked a guy for a belt."

Tyler said her sister was just nearby. "Her legs were hit pretty bad," said Tyler.

"I thought we were done with traumatic events," added Tyler.

"We're just so glad she didn't lose any of her limbs," said Janeiro, the family friend.

A gut-wrenching picture of Sydney being treated by two unidentified men is in today's Boston Globe, Tyler and his lifelong friend, Tom Janeiro, noted.

"We need to find out who those men were," said Tom. "We believe they saved Sydney's life."

"We just have to find out who those men were. Please help us."

Meanwhile, Corcoran's family has set up a website, http://www.gofundme.com/celesteandsydney, to accept donations.

"We're looking at prosthetics, house modifications," said Tim Corcoran. "We're looking at a long road here."

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